Sunday, February 11, 2007

Emirates News

I just watched Dubai One's Emirates News for the first time today. The half hour newscast is the first local English-language newscast in the UAE.

Kudos to One TV for taking that first step in catering to the non-Arabic speakers of the UAE (or to the Arabic speakers, like me, who do not read or watch the news in Arabic).

The newscast itself was OK, although could use some improvement. The studio is nicely designed, but the graphics looked a bit cartoonish.

The presenter looked like she had rehearsed one too many times, resulting in a lack of genuineness and believability. And she must have said "High Highness Sheikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister, and Ruler of Dubai" around 5 times in just the first 3 minutes of the newscast!

Also, every time a headline or title or name appears on screen, there's an annoying bell and swoosh sound that accompanies it, which is very distracting when you're trying to pay attention to what the presenter or reporter is saying.

Some of the stories covered were far from exciting, while others could have been reported with more depth, but like I said, this is the first newscast of its kind, and it's still in its infancy, so I'm sure there will be improvements along the way.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

How do you usually keep in touch with the world (in English)? On line or actual newspapers in english or Satellite TV in English? Which is your favourite?

Dubai Sunshine said...

Chazoo...I read CNN and BBC news and Gulf News online every day. I also get 7Days and Emirates Today at work (although not every day...) That's where I mostly get my news about what's happening in the world. I sometimes watch the news on TV (CNN, BBC, or Al Jazeera English), but that happens very rarely....

Keef said...

Sunshine, this is not the first UAE TV news - One TV's predecessor, Channel 33 used to do it. I haven't seen the new version (although it is welcome), but by the sound of it they are using the same old formula - they start off with pictures of whichever ruler has met a foreign visitor today, or pictures of nervous-looking government officials standing around the walls before going into a meeting: full names of Sheikhs going back two or three generations plus every single job they do are read out, and by the time you get to the end of that lot, you've run out of time for any actual news. Bit of a waste of time really.

Dubai Sunshine said...

Hey Keefie...Didn't know that Channel 33 had its own news program...Back in the day when Channel 33 existed, we never used to get a clear feed in Abu Dhabi for some reason...which was really disappointing because Channel 33 was the only channel that played decent movies and series!

Anonymous said...

I hardly watch it, only out of boredom and to look for something positive in it...hard to find, other than the set that looks like it cost a fortune..as we know, all is about appearances in this country. Some of the accents from these "journalists", good grief...one named Dana, sorry didn't catch her last name, I was cringing hearing her go on about Souped up cars in UAE...Ugh! terrible accent and her voice goes thru your head. Also, have you noticed the way they go on with their hands...jez ladies...cool it down..It seems they were just looking to get pretty faces on there, without caring much about quality of the broadcasting. and I agree about the Sheikhs names, my God, takes forever to say one name, again and again...and what's this stupid numbers thing...Today's number is...242, and goes on to say either it's the number of car accidents, or whatever..really lame....only reason I watched it at all really is i've got one of the cheaper cable versions, with all being repeats here no matter what evision package you get, figured i'd go for the basic...think it may be time to either upgrade or just start walking on the Corniche and get away from this really lame TV...